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2. It has been proposed to abolish the office of Sheriff, and have only the resident judge, investing him with all the functions of the Sheriff, and subjecting his decisions to an appeal like that now existing from the Sheriff. This is one proposal; and it is the favourite one, we understand, in Glasgow, probably in other provincial communities. It is of course much objected to both by the profession of the law in Edinburgh, and probably by the inhabitants generally. The difficulties attending so great a change have caused many who are inclined towards it to propose another plan, far less extensive, yet calculated to bestow a great benefit upon the country by working a very salutary improvement of the present system. It is suggested that the substitute should decide all cases of debt or damage not exceeding 50l. without any appeal to the Sheriff, but subject to appeal in matter of law to the Court, and also subject to application for a new trial when the judgment is for more than 87. 6s. 8d., the limit of the small-debt jurisdiction; that all written pleadings and depositions should be abolished, except a mere notice of claim, and of defence, so that the whole trial should be conducted vivâ voce, both by the parties, or their advocates, and by the witnesses.

3. That the first of these plans would be exceedingly difficult to carry, we consider as perfectly clear. The very smallest part of the difficulty is the necessity of providing for the existing Sheriffs, who would in almost every case refuse the offer of a larger salary conditioned upon residence in their counties. But this might be got over; there remains to be considered the great importance of the office in an executive as well as a judicial view. The Sheriff has the general superintendence of the police in his county. He is the returning officer in Parliamentary elections. He has jurisdiction on the claims to enrolment of voters. He returns the juries both for criminal and civil trials. In all Admiralty and some Commissariat causes, he has concurrent jurisdiction with the Court of Session since the Admiralty and the Com

Perth it is little more than one in four,-while for Ayrshire, it is no less than seven in nine. This would seem to indicate a very great difference in the quali

missary Courts were abolished. Since 1836 he has jurisdiction in Cessio bonorum; and he has criminal jurisdiction in misdemeanours without a jury, in greater offences with a jury, though such cases are rarely remitted to him by the public prosecutor.'

It is, however, from the great extent of his ordinary civil jurisdiction that the principal objection is taken to the abolition of the office. If the jurisdiction were confined, as in our County Courts, to causes of a middling importance, the Scotch would have a just right to complain of this limitation of local jurisdiction; and the vesting so large a jurisdiction as the Sheriff possesses in men who must be reckoned inferior members of the profession would be strongly objected to. The habits too of the legal profession would be so greatly altered by the change, that it is easy to see how strenuously that powerful body would resent it. At present, and ever since heritable jurisdictions were abolished a century ago, the office has been held by the more eminent of the practitioners. Almost all the Judges of the Superior Courts have been originally Sheriffs. It will likewise be contended that the Scotch Bar cannot furnish so many as fifty men capable of executing the important duties of Sheriff, if confined to residence in their counties, and without the advantages of attending the Court in the Capital.

We have stated the objections that are sure to be made, and for the present almost certain to prevail, but without at all meaning to affirm that we regard them as unanswerable. Some of them, indeed, as the one last stated, appear, when rightly considered, to tell the other way. For the existing system requires fifty men to be furnished by the Bar, or the body of writers and procurators as substitutes, and on them devolves the greater part by far, and the most difficult part, of the Sheriff's duties. Now either those substitutes are equal to the occasion, and competent to perform their duties; or they are not. If they are fit, the supply is sufficient; if they are unfit, the existing system is at fault, and a grievous

The number of criminal trials before Sheriffs, by the last Return, was between 40 and 50 in a year; about 70 being the number heard by the Supreme Court.

evil is created. The combined action of the resident and non-resident officer never can afford any remedy; for it only occasions the burthensome intermediate appeal. It is absurd to imagine that the unfitness of the substitute can be supplied by the fitness of the principal, because the latter is in no sense whatever a local judge, and the two taken together, if the substitute is unfit, do not constitute a fit local judge. An appeal to the Court would be quite as good a corrective to the substitute, if he is incompetent. Nevertheless we are quite aware of the weight of interest and opinion, of prejudice and authority, of the stability acquired by long existing establishments, of the aversion to new and untried arrangements; and we cannot expect the great change to be made at once, however much we may be convinced that ultimately the effectual remedy must be applied by the abolition of the double set of Sheriffs. The other plan appears to be on every account the more advisable for the present. It will give to Scotland the whole benefit of the English County Courts, introducing the procedure by oral pleadings and evidence, abolishing the intermediate appeal, and lessening incalculably both the expense and the delays of the Local Court.

We have adverted to the Assimilation question in connection with that of the Sheriffs' Courts. During the short Session of Parliament before the Easter recess, a Bill for an improvement in the Scotch Bankrupt Law was presented by Lord Brougham, embodying, as he stated it, the views which these parties entertained, and intended to introduce into the Scotch procedure in Bankruptcy the great improvements made in the English procedure during the last four-and-twenty years. He admitted, however, that their adoption in England in 1831 had been far easier than it would now be found in Scotland, because of the system already established being in its principles much more in accordance with those upon which the improvements were grounded. The Bill would of course be fully considered by the Commission. It had been drawn with great care by the united labours of the London Committee of mercantile men

House of Commons by Mr. Craufurd, for changing the system of the Sheriffs' Courts will, we conceive, also be submitted to the consideration of the Commission. The assimilation of the Mercantile Law, especially of the Bankrupt Law, cannot well be kept apart from the reform of the Sheriffs' Court jurisdiction.

LAW REPORTING.

WE have repeatedly alluded to the present state of Law Reporting, with a view to its reform. We broke ground in our Seventh Volume (Feb. 1848, pp. 223-246.); and this was followed by a Report of the Law Amendment Society on the subject, printed 10 L. R. 396-409. Recent circumstances have brought this subject much under notice; and the Profession seem disposed to throw off the intolerable yoke in which they have suffered themselves to be bound by the Law Booksellers. The time for grumbling is now gone by; but if the Judges will help, a scheme may be devised which would place this important department of legal literature on a better footing; and to this we hope to apply ourselves, and to have something to say to the purpose, hereafter.

To Subscribers.

In reply to a communication from Lord C., one of the Lords of Session, and others, we beg to say that the NOTES OF ADJUDGED POINTS, which we formerly gave in the "Law Review," will be resumed in our next Number.

THE

LAW REVIEW.

ART. I.-FUSION OF LAW AND EQUITY IN ENGLAND AND AMERICA.

1. Copy of the Second Report of Her Majesty's Commissioners for inquiring into the Process, Practice, and System of Pleading in the Superior Courts of Common Law, &c. London: 1853. 2. Report of the Commissioners on Practice and Pleadings. Code of Civil Procedure. Printed by order of the General Assembly of Ohio. Columbus: 1853.

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THE words "Fusion of Law and Equity" have for some time conveyed a tolerably distinct idea to the legal mind, and they are now made classical by the Common Law Commissioners; and, however surprising it may seem, they appear to be more than words, and that which, a few months ago, seemed to the most sanguine amongst us a distant possibility, is now (to use a Yankee phrase) about to be realised before many more months are past. This must be so, because we are approaching towards this "fusion" at both ends. We have it already in the North of our Island, and our cousins on the other side of the Atlantic are introducing it into State after State of the Union. We have just received the Report of the Commissioners of the important State of Ohio, who say that "while they have been chiefly indebted to the extraordinary labours of the New York Commissioners upon Practice and Pleadings, they have been assisted by those of Kentucky, Missouri, Indiana, Massachusetts, and other States, where the example of New York has been in a great degree followed." (P. 4.) Let us, then, first briefly trace the history of "fusion " in this country, and then see how it now stands. Although some

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